Kerala Assembly passes bill to replace Governor as Chancellor of universities

The Kerala Assembly passed the bill to replace the Governor as the Chancellor of universities in the state and appoint eminent academicians to the top post. These proceedings led to high drama in the assembly on Tuesday, December 13 and the opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) boycotted the House over non-acceptance of the bill. "The University Laws (Amendment) Bill is passed," Speaker AN Shamseer said, as stated in a report by PTI.

The bill was scrutinised by a Subject Committee of the House and was passed after hours-long discussions during which the Congress-led UDF said it was not opposed to the removal of the Governor as Chancellor. It wanted retired Supreme Court judges or former Kerala High Court chief justices to be considered for appointment at the helm of universities, it said. 

Further, there need not be different chancellors for each of the universities and the selection panel should comprise the Chief Minister, Leader of Opposition (LoP) and the Kerala High Court Chief Justice, the opposition added. One Chancellor for all universities was sufficient as day-to-day activities would be handled by the respective Vice-Chancellors, UDF said. 

On the other hand, state Law Minister P Rajeeve said that a judge cannot be a part of the selection panel and the Speaker can be a better choice. Further, regarding how many chancellors there can be, he said, "The number of chancellors can be decided later."

The condition of the opposition 

Accepting his suggestion regarding the selection panel, the opposition came up with one condition of appointing retired judges as Chancellor. Further, the opposition clarified that it was boycotting the House proceedings as it feared that the state government would attempt to turn state universities into Communist or Marxist centres by appointing their favourites at the helm, as stated in a report by PTI.

Also, the UDF said that the financial implication of having 14 Chancellors would turn it into a "white elephant." "Let there be only one Chancellor," the LoP said and was supported by IUML leader and MLA P K Kunhalikutty with the latter also saying, "there is no doubt that the Governor has to be removed as Chancellor".